There's no easy solution to your question :( Just go with the high size. These are all mods you said, so why not just have the user download large mods?
what? That doesn't seem to work at all.. It just shows spheres
Sphere is a model, not a texture.
It works very well. I'm using that and I'm only using dds images with that.
It's really just renaming the file ending from a legit ".dds" file to ".tga". The editor will throw errors because he expects a tga file, if you select the texture in the editor, but it works ingame and even on the imported model without restarting the editor as long as you didn't select/click on the model file before.
I don't know what you can do wrong... just rename the file ending, import, save, done.
Sphere is a model, not a texture.
It works very well. I'm using that and I'm only using dds images with that.
It's really just renaming the file ending from a legit ".dds" file to ".tga". The editor will throw errors because he expects a tga file, if you select the texture in the editor, but it works ingame and even on the imported model without restarting the editor as long as you didn't select/click on the model file before.
I don't know what you can do wrong... just rename the file ending, import, save, done.
wow... it actually does work! however I seem to be having a problem as it seems it messes with how the textures are shown on models.
Here is a picture:
The background of the textures seems to be non transparent for some reason. Maybe you can edit the texture files and remove the green background.
I'm not sure what is used for transparent.
likely its a problem with the way the programs used handle transparency and alpha channels.
Most file formats are treated in photoshop as if the alpha channel was extra and the transparency is multiplied into the color channels as partially erasing them. TGA is different though. It HAS to have an actual alpha channel to define the transparency and in photoshop will look none transparent but have a transparency mask in an alpha channel. GIMP works the same way but displays things a little differently. Its harder to get the issue confused in GIMP.
I'd have to know the specific workflow used to create these assets to tell you how it happened though.
Transparency in SC2 is handled in a specific "Transparency" channel in the shader. Usually the alpha channel of the Diffuse map is plugged into this ('Use Alpha Channel' checkbox in Diffuse map, in Max). If the Diffuse is being used for Team Colo, sometimes the Specular map is given an alpha channel that is used for transparencies instead.
The problem you have might be that the alpha isn't being pathed properly, so you might be able to fix it with TextureSelectByID; or resourcing the path in the .m3 through 3DS Max. Another problem may be that the .tga/.dds might have lost it's alpha channel during your conversions, or maybe that the alpha isn't being recognized by the .dds renaming trick.
no, there isn't
That said, SC2 supports various size textures and there is certain data that is unnecessary but sometimes still there.
2 prime examples are:
Normal maps with more channels than needed having image data in them. If the Normal only uses 2 channels, then don't paste your image data is the others, its takes up space.
Smaller textures scaled up are often just fine. A 256x256 normal map is sometimes acceptable and is only a quarter the files size of a 1024x1024 normal.
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@Terminator8: Go
There's no easy solution to your question :( Just go with the high size. These are all mods you said, so why not just have the user download large mods?
@Terminator8: Go
As was said earlier, there are ways to change all the file paths and there are ways to batch convert all the files. That is your solution.
I can promise one thing though, people aren't going to be happy about mod files that are 8 times bigger than they need to be.
Sphere is a model, not a texture.
It works very well. I'm using that and I'm only using dds images with that.
It's really just renaming the file ending from a legit ".dds" file to ".tga". The editor will throw errors because he expects a tga file, if you select the texture in the editor, but it works ingame and even on the imported model without restarting the editor as long as you didn't select/click on the model file before.
I don't know what you can do wrong... just rename the file ending, import, save, done.
wow... it actually does work! however I seem to be having a problem as it seems it messes with how the textures are shown on models. Here is a picture:
Edit: Note it only seems to affect a few
The background of the textures seems to be non transparent for some reason. Maybe you can edit the texture files and remove the green background.
I'm not sure what is used for transparent.
@Ahli634: Go
likely its a problem with the way the programs used handle transparency and alpha channels. Most file formats are treated in photoshop as if the alpha channel was extra and the transparency is multiplied into the color channels as partially erasing them. TGA is different though. It HAS to have an actual alpha channel to define the transparency and in photoshop will look none transparent but have a transparency mask in an alpha channel. GIMP works the same way but displays things a little differently. Its harder to get the issue confused in GIMP.
I'd have to know the specific workflow used to create these assets to tell you how it happened though.
Transparency in SC2 is handled in a specific "Transparency" channel in the shader. Usually the alpha channel of the Diffuse map is plugged into this ('Use Alpha Channel' checkbox in Diffuse map, in Max). If the Diffuse is being used for Team Colo, sometimes the Specular map is given an alpha channel that is used for transparencies instead.
The problem you have might be that the alpha isn't being pathed properly, so you might be able to fix it with TextureSelectByID; or resourcing the path in the .m3 through 3DS Max. Another problem may be that the .tga/.dds might have lost it's alpha channel during your conversions, or maybe that the alpha isn't being recognized by the .dds renaming trick.
@Triceron: Go
What I'd really like to know if there is anyway to compress a .dds even further.
@Enexy: Go
no, there isn't That said, SC2 supports various size textures and there is certain data that is unnecessary but sometimes still there.
2 prime examples are: Normal maps with more channels than needed having image data in them. If the Normal only uses 2 channels, then don't paste your image data is the others, its takes up space.
Smaller textures scaled up are often just fine. A 256x256 normal map is sometimes acceptable and is only a quarter the files size of a 1024x1024 normal.